Hi,
I'm an Israeli citizen holding a Romanian (EU) passport. I have a wife and a kid and we set ourselves a goal to naturalize in France. I am about to start my Ph.D. in physics in an Israeli university, but I will physically reside in France and work in CERN (which is an international organization situated on the border between France and Switzerland).
I'm in the early research stages of the process, so I have a few basic questions which hopefully somebody knowledgeable and/or somebody who went through a similar process could help me with.
1. As a European (Romanian) citizen, do I need a work permit or any permit at all for the years living in France to count for naturalization?
2. Which documents would I need to present to the French authorities to prove that I've actually been living on French territory for 5 years?
3. Do my wife and kid need any permits to stay in France long-term?
4. How long should the process take in total, starting with the day we move to France to the day we receive the citizenship, assuming we do everything required of us on time? Could it really take 5 years or does it usually take longer?
Thank you for your help! 
Naturalization in France for Family of EU Citizen
Hi daveriek,
You can get a good look of what's ahead here:
http://accueil-etrangers.gouv.fr/acces- … -e-a-un-e/
1) members of the EU "exercise their rights of free movement" when they arrive in France. Please look up exactly what that entails, but you should be able to work with no particular issue.
2) they generally want a lot of documents! Count on having a justificatif de domicile for each 6 months of the 5 years required. It helps if you register at the Mairie / préfecture, so they also have a record.
3) your family piggybacks onto your rights. Some time after you have registered, then they do so.
4) the process of nationalization *starts* after 5 years of residence. After that, you submit your dossiers. Everything depends on your préfecture - you use their list, and follow their process. Many currently are taking 2+ years after the dossier is accepted, so it's a long haul.
I am not European, so don't know all the rules for you, but I am in the middle of gathering my dossier.
You can find out more about residence for your case using the website above (just start from the main menu). Also, as soon as you know your préfecture, go to their website for exactly what they want.
Another resource is the group "Applying for French Nationality" on Facebook.
Good luck,
Julie
Julie, thank you very much for your detailed reply. This really helped.
I'm also an EU citizen, living in the U.S., considering a move to France. What would be the purpose of naturalizing since you already have the right to work and free movement? Is it for your families citizenship?
For now it's for the family, since my wife doesn't hold a European passport. however the ultimate goal is to naturalize in Switzerland and become Swiss nationals. The problem is that I'm the only one who will receive any income (in the form of a scholarship) during my Ph.D. studies, which will not be nearly enough for the entire family to 'survive' 4 or 5 (duration of Ph.D.) of the 10 years required in Switzerland for holders of a Romanian passport. Also, Switzerland requires to hold certain permits for the residence time to count, which I'm not sure a Ph.D. student from a non-EU university working in an international organization (CERN) can easily obtain.
Living in France, on the other hand is cheaper and requires no special permits. Additionally, for French nationals, Switzerland requires only a 5-year residence, so, taking into account the extra 2-3 years for the nationalization bureaucracy in France, we can get both a French and a Swiss passport in a relatively short time. And if naturalizing in Switzerland fails for some unforeseen reason, we would still all be French nationals.
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